First up, a disclaimer and an apology. Having never achieved anything of particular note in the game before (aside from my stunning Coventry Championships victory over Matteo Orsini-Jones) I have been lax in noting down anything of consequence from my matches. Hence, I have forged the following report from a mixture of memory, deduction, and pure fantasy. Sorry if I have forgotten or neglected anything, and I’d be happy to be corrected on any count in the forums. Additionally, I hopelessly lost control of my tenses as I wrote up over a couple of days.

Our accommodation for a pleasant, sunny week on the south coast (props to Chris H. for his organisational skills) was a luxury flat near the seafront in Hove. However, the advertised 10 sleeping slots would have involved some homoeroticism*. Compounding the bedlessness was the prodigious snoring capacity of 50% of the house. No sooner had I drifted off to sleep than I was being woken up by the soundtrack to Tremors. I wore earplugs, tore them out, slept on the floor of the main bedroom, slept in the bathroom, attempted to sleep in the garden. Eventually I obtained a scant few hours on Friday night kipping in the front door aperture. I did have a great time hanging out with the guys, testing some standard and drafting Shards block though, so the venture was still a real pleasure – shout out to the St Aubyn’s massive.

*If anyone needs pick-up tips from Brighton, I refer you to Mr Rufus Frenzel and Mr Rob Hall. As long as you don’t mind hanging about kebab shops.

Bleary-eyed and with that eerie drunkenness of sleep deprivation making me fast and loose with my conversation, we set off for the venue. The prospect of a fourth consecutive day of highly focused MTG play was making me feel slightly gruesome, and some small voice in my head was telling me that perhaps it would be best to be eliminated early so I could go and sit on the beach.

I came into Grand Prix Brighton on an inauspicious run from Nationals. Although I was very pleased by opening a sixteen-megaton Jund deck in the LCQ and auto-piloting it to qualification, I struggled to a 5-4 record in the tournament. This included a game loss for drawing extra cards (!) from an extremely advantageous position in an unfavourable matchup, and a bye in my second draft pod. Underwhelming, considering my aspirations, but I drew some small consolation from posting a positive record in my first UK nationals.

The Pool:

I was alerted to the possibility of playing blue by the presence of no less than Mind Control, Djinn of Wishes and Sleep. Green, Red and Black offered little aside from the possibility of Doomblade. White, as is my experience, delivered a solid base of early creatures and reasonably costed fliers. In the end I opted for a quickish U-W list with manifold two drops, some walls and fliers, and a debased manabase involving a single Terramorphic Expanse to fix my black splash of t’ Blade and Gravedigger. After a bit of post-construction testing and conversation with Rich and Chris H, we were in agreement that it would probably have been better to just run my sideboard counterspells maindeck over the greedy splash, and this was a change I implemented commonly post-board through the tournament.

Rounds 1 & 2: Ranking byes, courtesy of Manchester PTQ and GPT Prague in Coventry. Thanks to all my opponents who made this possible.

2-0

Round 3: Tomas Kasinski (B-R/U-B)

Tomas is a nice guy, but his frenetic play-speed, coupled with an anxious demeanour, was contagious. I caught myself throwing cards down and rushing decisions, having to reel myself in continually. Is this the high-intensity, ultra-competitive environment I have oft been warned about?

Game one I crawled out of the blocks with a solitary three-drop while my opponent on the play hit me with Piker, Warpath and Goblin Chieftain. I stabilised at two life for a few more turns but eventually he found a hole in my defences. Game two featured a counter-suite from the sideboard including Flashfreeze, and his aggressive black-red beats took me to perilously low life. My downwards descent was arrested by some wall-like creatures and I flew over for victory at 6 life. In the decider he boarded into blue-black, but neutering most of his potency in exchange for castrating my single Flashfreeze turned out to be a gambit too far and I won comfortably.

3-0

Round 4: Nicholas Clark (U-G-r)

Having been put on edge by my previous opponent, a friendly greeting and chat with Nick Clark returns me to the comfort zone.

I won either game one or game two without memorable plays. In the other game, my obtuse walls and tappers did a good job of negating his solid green-blue base to the point where I was nibbling his life away with my assortment of winged bad beaters. However, just as Chris Harrold brutalised me in a pre-tournament friendly, a timely Overrun crashed me to almost nothing and triggered Operation Desperation. The tables, already violently inverted, were rendered unto matchsticks by the arrival of a Kalonian Behemoth which ate a creature per turn until I was in negative digits.

Game three and I open on a triple mulligan. 3-1 with two byes is hardly heaping on the glory, is it? Except somehow... somehow... I get into the game with a series of perfect draws. My four is three land and Wind Drake, and I top-deck Mind Control to take over the limited brainpower of his Air Elemental. Employing my favourite underrated common, I Excommunicate an Awakened forest. I am three swings away from victory when I draw Sleep and am faced with the possibility of snatching the most unlikely of match wins. I get in for six to drop him to 12 sandbagging the Sleep, and he Overruns to kill me with Awakener Druid, Birds of Paradise and Mist Leopard.

Cue pram-toy-explosion.

3-1

Round 5: Bradley Barclay (G-B)

Seven hundred and sixty players and I’m up against an old friend in my second match. Not any old scrub either, one of Scotland’s best, with a load of Pro Tour appearances and an enviable playing record. He always beats me too, having effectively eliminated me from Nationals contention two days previously. We sit down with the unspoken chagrin of players that would rather not face one another (although given his record against me, perhaps he was less unhappy than I was).

If my aging, failing memory serves me well enough, I lost the first game to some slight mana issues coupled with his comprehensive removal suite and a couple of evasive creatures, including at least one Dread Warlock. Game two was very similar in reverse, except with tempo cards and tappers rather than removal spells. In the third, Rampant Growth into Cudgel Troll into Awakener Druid saw me take eight before I laid my fourth land. I had Excommunicate for the forest, but couldn’t deal with the troll before I died.

Hobbling in at 1-2 in matches played, my chances of day 2 are rapidly going the way of the dodo.

3-2

Round 6: Franck Filatriau (R-B)

Very relaxed French gentleman, whose English is not exceptional from our small exchanges. I take overzealous delight in using my limited French to communicate damage and life totals. I get the impression that both of us already consider ourselves to be out of the tournament.

The games were quite brief – in game one I see a little removal and some solid enough men from him, but he mounts no resistance as I take effective control with a Blinding Mage and a giant, unbreakable Siege Mastodon, and win with evasive men.

In the second game he has Magma Phoenix, but I kill it once and he drops to low enough life that recurring it would prove nearly fatal. In the end my splashed Gravedigger returns a lethal Snapping Drake.

4-2

Round 7: Danial Mior (G-W)

What’s that coming over the hill? It’s DANIAL MIOR!

Faithful Danial, who beats me up on a regular basis in FNM. However, this time he informs me he has nowhere to stay for the evening and plans to return to London. With no intention of playing day 2, he says he will probably scoop to me. At this point, I am caught in that unpleasant quandary where a highly desirable freebie is on the table, but one feels honour-bound to reject it in the name of fairness. I tell him he’s welcome to stay with us (knowing secretly that if he beats me and takes me up on the offer, he’ll get his just deserts with the Snore Brigade back at the house).

I stall on mana in the first game and Serra Angel slaughters me, only slightly inhibited by Excommunication. One would think being cast out of the Church would be problematic for an angel...

Game two sees me quadruple mulligan. I hold out my hand, but Danial beats me to the punch and signs the slip in my favour. FOR WHICH I WILL BE ETERNALLY GRATEFUL.

5-2

Round 8: Christian Bateman (B-W)

I recognise my opponent as being from the stables of Orsini-Jones the Younger. As this breeding programme has already produced one National Champion in the preceding few days, I fear for my day 2 chances once again. It should be noted that Christian is altogether more respectful and polite than M. O-J, and with luck should exert a positive influence now that they will be residing together in domestic bliss.

Baneslayer Angel kills me in one game, but in the others a combination of my three blue bombs (including a double-wish in response to a removal spell on the Djinn) get me over the finishing line. It’s blurry, but I recall my maindeck Undead Slayer exiling a critical Drudge Skeletons equipped with Magebane Armour to get my hordes of soldiers in for lethal damage in the deciding game.

6-2

Round 9: Jan Van Nieuwenhove (U-W)

Jan is an affable Belgian and we are on good terms as the round begins. However, we aren’t under any illusions: this is the last elimination match for day 2.

The match is a blue-white mirror. He stalls on lands in the first game, eventually churning through half his deck with Merfolk Looter. I bleed him to 8 life, but he has board dominance and crashes his creatures in to reduce me to a meagre 4. All for nothing, as I finally top-deck my second island for Sleep. With an active Blinding Mage and four points of power on the table, he suffers the ignominy of dying to Coral Merfolk.

Game two and the Merfolk Looter is back, but he has even less lands this time. As he makes his third drop, I Mind Control the Looter and start churning through my deck. He dies with little further resistance. He was clearly very unhappy at missing out on the second day and left abruptly, but I bumped into him on Sunday before he caught the bus back to the continent and he was very warm and convivial – these Belgians are an underrated bunch!

7-2

Against the odds I’ve guaranteed myself an 8 am start for the following day. Resisting the urge to fall asleep where I sit, instead I regroup with some of my Scottish cadre and we go looking for food. Emerging from seven rounds in the Brighton Centre is like being Jonah, expelled forcibly from a whale’s belly – you are assailed by the brightness of even the late afternoon sun, the vital smells of the seaside, the raw colour of a world beyond black, white, red, green and blue. But I’m happy to be going back into the beast the next morning!

To be continued!

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